Brutal Mercies
by Idream3223
Summary: Andre decides it's time to force Sookie into a blood bond and Eric interferes. What should she have been thinking as they bargained for her soul?


*One Shot* SVM/Set in **_All Together Dead_**, The infamous bonding scene/OOC/NC-17 for adult content.

_For this not familiar with the books this scene takes place at the hotel in Rhodes where Queen Sophie's right hand man Andre sweeps Sookie away and tries to force his blood on her after Russell's wedding, which Eric had officiated. He is still wearing his long black ceremonial cape from the event when he feels her distress and shows up to offer a bond with himself, as "the lesser of two evils." He tells Andre that Sookie and he have shared blood before, and that they have been lovers. He does not mention that he does not remember this time with her and only knows because he forced her to tell him. He does not confess how much it bothers him to not remember what they were or what they shared._

_Just before the trip to Rhodes, Pam pays Sookie and visit and asks her to have mercy on Eric because he is distraught about not being able to remember what happened between them when the witch took his memories. Eric interrupts that visit to ask her if she has chosen the Tiger (Quinn) as her mate and kisses her before he disappears into the night. _

_In the book she specifically tells him, as she grudgingly agrees to accept him that there will be no sex when they bond and she is dismissive of his efforts to protect her from Andre's gaze with his long cloak. Her mind is on Quinn and how she feels betrayed by vampires that she had helped. Her mind is not on Eric, and I wanted to change that. I wanted her to be smarter and see what he was offering her, the value of it, and how much it must have cost him to expose himself like that and offer to intervene on her behalf with Andre._

_This is how I always thought that scene should have gone._

**Brutal Mercies**

_…have mercy on Eric, Sookie. Please…_

_Have you chosen then…?_

Who are you, Sookie?

_A victim…a fool…a player…Wait, was I playing?_ His beautiful lips were moving as he looked at Andre and bargained for my soul, I knew that. On some level I heard that. On every level I felt that. It was me, he was me…there was **_we_**.

Eric and I were **_we_** in a way that Bill and I never were, and Quinn and I never could be.

…_have mercy…_Pam whispered to me just as Eric looked at me and raised his eyebrow waiting to see if I would choose him or accept Andre. What had seemed so difficult and confusing just a moment ago was now suddenly clear, like a sunny meadow once the fog was blown away. I had been worried about how to make it work with Quinn and lost in the difficulty of that proposition, feeling again the things I had felt with Bill at the end of our relationship.

_It shouldn't be this hard._

And then there was Eric. _You have chosen then?_

If time had been mine I would have stupidly left this gorgeous man here while I went to find Quinn and explain how wrong we had been about our relationship. I would tell him that I understood now why it was so hard between us. It wasn't meant to be. That I had clarity now and I could see that I was using him.

Quinn was my rebound from a lover who had abandoned me and another who had forgotten me entirely. I was using him to soothe my aches. Explaining first would have been the right thing to do, so I would have tried to end things with Quinn before I turned back to Eric and tried to start things in the right way.

But really, what the fuck did I know about the 'right way' to do anything? My role model was a self-involved southern debutante who threw love away with both hands to chase some man that she only wanted because he didn't want her. She lied to herself and called it a challenge, but it was really her ego driving. Everyone had to adore Scarlett, and woe be unto the conquered masses of adorers. She lost her Rhett by shoving him away.

Now, I stood here before my undead Rhett, his eyebrow up in askance, hoping that I find him at least more acceptable than Andre. _Oh, Eric, how sorry I am that this is even a question in your heart!_ My protector was standing right here before me, and while I had no choice but to deal him first, I didn't want another choice.

For a split second I wanted to hug Andre for hamstringing me so, but feared it would derail the intercession that Eric had just risked so much to offer. _Later_, I thought, _after Quinn I will send Andre and the Queen some flowers as a thank you for placing me where I wanted to be even though I was too foolish to see it until now._

"I know what I think this means, Eric, at least to me, but what does it mean to vampires? To you?" His other eyebrow went up and hope flared in his eyes as he looked down at me. This wasn't the time, but it was the only time we had. He growled softly in his chest.

"It would be a _permanent_ bond between us, _never_ to be broken. Always we would be connected, able to …feel each other." I stepped closer and took his hand, running my thumb over the back of his large palm.

"Like this?" I asked softly, loving how his fingers threaded through mine without hesitation or thought; they knew home.

"More," he said, coming closer to me now, his voice going deeper.

"My anger?" He nodded, looking deep into my eyes. "My choices?" His face went stony blank and he squeezed my hand slightly before he got himself under control and nodded again.

"You have chosen then?" he asked as he had a few nights ago. Looking into his eyes I tilted my head to the side offering myself to him. His back was to Andre so he didn't see the mix of desire and emotion that covered Eric's face. He didn't see Eric's hand tremble ever so slightly, but I felt it. He spoke to Andre over his shoulder.

"I would like to complete the bonding privately."

"No. Do it here. Do it now." Eric looked at me begging me to understand. I shook my head slightly and stepped closer my hand coming up to his face thrilled to see his eye lids flutter slightly at my touch. I knew what I wanted now. I just had to find the spine to say it. Standing tall, and looking deep in his eyes I told him, not bothering to whisper, because really what was the point?

"I want…" I stopped and licked my lips. "I've missed…" I stopped again, hearing my blood pounding through veins so loudly it almost drowned out the sound of my own voice. Eric was leaning closer to me, pressing in to make sure he heard every word I said as though his life was depending on it and maybe, just maybe it did. "You," I finally managed to get out, praying that the Eric who always got me, got this and understood that I was asking him to help me forget where we were and remember where we had been.

"That's how it was when…?" this time his voice trailed off, leaving me to get it and understand that he was asking if this is what it was like when he was not himself. _Did we care for each other like this before? _ I nodded.

"And more," I added sliding my arms around his solid form unable to suppress the sounds of pleasure and sighs of contentment that bubbled out of me from being in his arms again. He held me but a moment before his hands pulled the hood up on his long black cloak and then pulled it out to cover me as well. I was touched by his thoughtfulness. My hand came up to his face. "Always?" I asked him to make sure that he was sure. I could be a hand full even on a good day.

"Always," he said and then he swooped in with cloak covered arms and kissed me. My arms slid up under his, my palms coming to rest on his back. His hands came up under my hips, lifting me up as he pressed me back against the wall. My legs helping by wrapping around his hips, placing him right where I wanted him most. To reassure him of that my hands slipped down to his perfect bottom and pulled him against my hot core while at the same time I deepened the kiss and thought all the things I longed to be brave enough to say. Things that no doubt I would get to in the span of "always".

_I have missed you more than you could ever know…If you ever lie to me I am going to drag you out in the sun and tan your hyde!...You feel so good…If you cheat on me I will cut off your Gracious Plenty!...I want you inside me when we bond, Eric…If you betray me I will stake you!...Teach me how to be someone I can be proud of…If you leave me again after this I will hunt you down and shoot your kneecaps out with silver bullets!...Teach me how to let someone love me…_

I was a tumbling mass of emotion and maybe he couldn't read my mind, but he could feel the tears sliding down my face as I ground my hips against his hard shaft, whimpering for his touch. He could feel my need, both physical and emotional in our blood tie. He could feel me suffocating as the Sookie I had been gave up the ghost and the Sookie I wanted to be dived into him like he was the ocean.

His fingers slipped between us and were moving between my thighs, making me ready as he had those few precious nights we shared. The cloak protected me from Andre's eyes but the sounds I was making as I surrendered to Eric's touch were still painting a clear picture of what was happening between us. I was appalled only in the truth that I didn't care.

For so long I had lived my life like other people thought I should. It left me beat up and alone. Now…_now_ I was for once going to do just exactly what I wanted to do. It might work out, it might not, but it would be easier to pay for if I picked out something I wanted instead of what everyone told me I should want. If this went south I would pony up.

He removed my panties with a flick of his wrist and then I felt him, hard and pulsing at my entrance. "Yesssssss," I whispered in his ear, as I tugged his long blond hair under the black velvet hood. Eric groaned and swiveled his hips, working into me inch by precious inch as I latched on and sucked his neck, leaving a hickey. I hardly cared, he would heal in no time, and the feeling made him crazy, just it had before, increasing the speed of his hips.

He rested his forehead against mine for a moment when I was fully impaled on his thick hard cock, back pressed to wall, legs locked around his hips, forbidding him to leave me until he had provided the satisfaction he promised himself capable of in every word and deed.

When his hips pulled back and I felt the length of him rising out of me I wanted to beg him not to leave me, beg him to press me hard against the wall and push as deeply into me as he could until he touched all the places in me that felt like they belonged just to him. Mindless of pride and subterfuge when I felt him almost completely gone from me I clutched at his head and whispered into his ear. "Make me yours…"

His hands pressed against the concrete wall on either side of my head as he held my body with his against the wall. He was thrusting into me deep and hard and I was grateful, perhaps for the first time that I had some extra padding on my hips and that my frame was solid. Nothing less could have taken what he was giving as he surrendered to his passion.

His face captivated me, and while he gave my body everything it could ever have wanted it was his face that fed my heart. It was absolutely crystal clear in the look on his face that he was as swept away by what was happening between us I was. I pulled his lips to mine and opened my mouth like I was going to eat him and felt him press further into me where we were joined below making me whimper. His hands came up under my hips pulling me onto him, opening me to him in a new angle that sent me right over the edge in just a few strokes.

His fangs slipped into my neck while I convulsed between his body and the wall, my head finally falling to his neck where I tore into him with my blunt teeth gulping him down, set on fire by his still hard cock stretching my tight core around him and his cold blood setting my throat ablaze as I swallowed him. Any moment I expected him to explode inside me, I needed him to do it, but his hips slowly stopped moving and his kisses became softer as he licked my wounds closed and rested his head on my neck taking in deep breaths of my scent.

I could feel him so contented. Right there, right in that moment, he felt exactly as safe and cherished in my arms as I did in his. More than ever I wanted to give him the same pleasure that he had just given me. He wanted me, of that his new swirling emotions mixing with mine told me that with perfect clarity. They also told me that he wanted to protect me. He wanted to take from Andre's prying gaze and finish what we had started here now that the requisite blood sharing had been completed. I tugged his hair and brought his gaze to mine.

I was done pretending.

"I love you," I mouthed the words silently to him, still hid from Andre's view. I didn't care that he was there. It's not like they all wouldn't know we had had sex, they were vampires, sniffing, smelling, nosy, gossipy vampires. I couldn't do anything about that, but what I felt, what I had to say, that was for Eric alone. "Make me yours," I said again, out loud as I had before and when he thrust into me again I thought I would die right there in his arms. I was still sensitive from my last orgasm, and I was stretched around him so tightly in his swollen state that I could feel every bump and ridge of his flesh as he rocked into me, focused only now on making me his.

He had shivered inside me when I told him I loved him. I was shivering his arms now, panting, moaning and sweating against the wall as he fucked me deep, hard and fast, unable to hold himself back anymore. Feeling his passion spill deep inside me sent me over the edge in his arms again and I bit his neck again taking another pull of his blood and was rewarded by feeling his cock jerk inside me as he came again. He groaned and shuddered between my thighs, pressing his whole body against mine.

He kissed me softly, slowly and then he raised me off him and gently set my feet on the floor. He straightened my clothes and kissed me one last time before turning back to face Andre with a flourish of his long black cloak.

The hall was empty. At some point, Andre had left us. I looked at Eric and thought about making a joke, something to break the tension. Then I realized that I didn't have to do with him. I didn't have to be funny. I didn't have to be anything but Sookie, and he was fine with that. I pulled him down for another kiss, and then hugged him.

"I will tell the Tiger," he said sounding triumphant as he kissed the top of my head.

"We will tell Quinn. He will never believe just you." His hand rubbed my back.

"I don't care what he believes."

"It's a small world, Eric. Who knows when we might see him again and perhaps even need to call upon him for assistance?" He growled softly and kissed my forehead again before starting to move us toward the nearest exit.

"There is a dance later," he said in my ear as we moved through the door.

"Will you save one for me?" I asked him, my arm around his waist as we walked down the hall. He stopped suddenly and turned to face me, looking shocked.

"This is really happening, isn't it?" His hands came up to my face, his eyes demanding that that I tell him the truth. I probably would have taken it the wrong way before the bond, but now I could feel his happiness growing at the prospect of us sharing this blood bond. "I'm not dreaming, Sookie?" he pressed me to answer, demanding that I give into him.

"Shall I tell you all the things that I find completely insufferable about you, Sheriff Northman? Would that reassure you that I did indeed just moments ago, 'yield to you'?" I teased in my best tone of anger and disappointment, which lasted all of ten second before my smile took over and made him blink as if the sun had risen in the hotel hall.

"Yes, please tell me each one, loudly and in excruciating detail, Miss Stackhouse," he said, before he smiled back at me, his arm sliding around me again as we went down the hall. "And I will save all my dances for you, from here on out," he whispered in my ear before planting a kiss on my cheek. I giggled and took a deep breath before trying to sound serious as I spoke.

"The first thing is your enormous-"

"My enormous what?" he pounced, the devil dancing in his eyes.

"Mouth," I finished, pursing my lips to keep from smiling.

"Shall I show you what it is for, my lover?" I stopped and turned to him.

"Yes, do that." I was half messing with you and half serious. In for a penny, after all.

"Now?" he asked bouncing on his toes in anticipation.

"Yes." His cry of delight made the doors in the corridor open and guests glance up and down the corridor to see what was causing the disturbance, but my lover swept me away at blurry speed to his room to capitulate to my demands.

This being bonded thing might be even better than I thought.


End file.
